Hotel chain uses robot to transform guests’ sleep into work of art

A contest run by hotel chain Ibis is offering guests a night with a robot. Before your mind fills with sordid images of grotesque bed-based entanglements involving a human and an android, perhaps we should explain.

The robot will transform your night’s sleep into a painting by interpreting data from 80 sensors concealed in your mattress that track temperature, movement and sound. The promotional campaign is part of an Ibis-run project called Sleep Art.

We assume that if you’re prone to uncomfortable sleeps with demon-filled nightmares causing you to toss and turn more than a canoeist in an ocean storm, your painting is going to end up more Jackson Pollock than Claude Monet.

“What does sleep look like?” the promotional video asks. “Combining comfort with technology, our masterpiece is to make your sleep a true work of art.”

Anyone interested in discovering how a robot interprets their sleep still has more than a month to put their name in the hat, via Ibis’s Facebook page. In total, 40 guests will have their sleep painted by the robot, in a hotel in either London, Paris or Berlin, with the first brush strokes being applied on October 13.

Selected guests will awake to a unique painting created from their night’s sleep and will receive a copy of the artwork to be either hung on the wall at home or placed at the back of the closet without a word to anyone.